--doctor flag doesn't work!

[roeybenarieh]

I got the error "VM service not running. The service failed to start." and I wanted to diagnose the problem.
When running "claude-desktop --doctor" I don't get any doctor output.

I am running NixOS 26.05.
Tried installing both pkgs.claude-desktop-fhs and pkgs.claude-desktop and in both the "--doctor" doesn't work.

Screenshots

running the command:

viewed error:

Appreciate your help :-)

[github-actions]

Both issues trace to the Nix packaging, not the upstream app.

--doctor silence (related: #282)

The flag is intercepted in the deb/AppImage launcher scripts (build-appimage.sh:77-82, build-deb-package.sh:78-81). The Nix package uses makeWrapper, which passes all args straight through to Electron. Electron doesn't handle --doctor. The flag disappears silently. A writeShellScript wrapper in the Nix derivation could intercept --doctor before falling through to the Electron call, the same way the AppImage launcher does.

VM service not running

The app looks for cowork-vm-service.js at process.resourcesPath/app.asar.unpacked/cowork-vm-service.js. The Nix build doesn't put it there. The deb/AppImage builds handle this in build.sh. Adding it to the Nix installPhase should fix it:

mkdir -p $out/lib/claude-desktop/resources/app.asar.unpacked
install -Dm644 ${./scripts/cowork-vm-service.js} \
  $out/lib/claude-desktop/resources/app.asar.unpacked/cowork-vm-service.js

Verify that process.resourcesPath resolves to $out/lib/claude-desktop/resources/ in the Nix layout before assuming the path is right.

---

Written by Claude Sonnet via Claude Code

[roeybenarieh]

Can someone implement this?

[roeybenarieh]

Used Claude for this so I guess its not 100%

This is what it came up with:
changes.patch

both the --doctor flag and the cowork-vm-service are now working great!

Appreciate it if someone can look at the patch and correct it :-)

[ecrevisseMiroir]

I can confirm the --doctor flag does not work with the RPM version. The appimage works fine

[asheriif]

--doctor flag doesn't work for me either with the RPM version. Same for CLAUDE_USE_WAYLAND=1 environment variable actually, also doesn't get picked up. Both work fine in AppImage version.